National News

TV Station (Mis)Reports SF Crash Pilot as 'Sum Ting Wong'

(NEWSER) – There's not fact checking, and then there's ... not even using your brain. A newscast on Bay Area Fox affiliate KTVU apparently fell for a (racist and offensive) joke, incorrectly reporting that the pilots of the plane that crashed at San Francisco airport were named "Sum Ting Wong," "Ho Lee Fuk," "Bang Ding Ow," and "Wi Tu Lo,"SF Weekly reports.

The network later apologized, but said an NTSB official in Washington had "confirmed" them. It wasn't exactly an official. Per the NTSB: "Earlier today, in response to an inquiry from a media outlet, a summer intern acted outside the scope of his authority when he erroneously confirmed the names of the flight crew on the aircraft." The kicker, asMediabistro notes, is that KTVU had just been boasting about its "100% accurate" coverage of the disaster earlier this week.